News, Entertainment, Enlightenment
PCN Hosts Guzzardi March 18 2014 — Bob Guzzardi, the Republican alternative to Tom Corbett in the May 20 gubernatorial primary, will be the guest 7 to 8, tonight, on Brian Lockman’s call-in show on PCN.
Those with questions are encouraged to ask that by calling 1-877-726-5001.
The show can be heard here.
Bob Guzzardi (right) with Roger Howard who is seeking to represent the 158th District in the State House
Government unions aren’t about fightingfor public employees and workers any more — they’ve become political operations with agendas that harm both their members and taxpayers. Americans, and even union members themselves, increasingly realize that public-sector unions often do not serve the public interest.
As a consequence, several states — including Washington, Idaho, Utah, Michigan, and Wisconsin — have passed commonsense “paycheck protection” laws to protect employees and taxpayers from being abused by union bosses. Lawmakers in my home state of Pennsylvania are looking to follow their lead. The idea is so sensible that polling suggests the majority of members of Pennsylvania union households support it.
Paycheck protection is a simple reform that would prohibit
taxpayer-funded “automatic deduction” of dues and campaign contributions
from government-union members’ paychecks. Current law grants government
union leaders the unique privilege of using public resources (the
government payroll system) to collect their union dues and PAC money,
which they use for lobbying and political activity. Dues are mandatory
and can go to certain political purposes, while members can agree to
make extra donations to PACs — also collected by the state payroll
system — which can be spent on almost any political activity.
Like every politically privileged group, union leaders are fighting
tooth and nail to hold on to this unfair advantage. Recently,
Pennsylvania’s union bosses stormed our state capitol to protest
paycheck protection by ranting against “big corporations” and even
leading obscene chants. Yet union leaders danced around the core policy
issue: whether taxpayer resources should be used for politics.
Perhaps that’s because many bussed-in union protesters actually
supported the concept of paycheck protection. When Media Trackers asked protesters
why they thought the government should collect their union dues, union
members answered that government shouldn’t be involved. Ironically, this
is exactly what paycheck protection would mean.
In fact, this is the view of most union members. In a new survey
of union households in Pennsylvania, we found that a large majority
support paycheck-protection legislation. Nearly two-thirds agreed that
such a law would empower workers to have greater control over how their
money is spent on politics. Moreover, an overwhelming 80 percent of
union households said taxpayer resources should not be used to collect
campaign contributions.
Several Pennsylvania legislators have recently gone to prison for
using taxpayer resources for politics. Yet government unions are
permitted to essentially engage in this practice right under the capitol
dome and in public schools across our state.
Taxpayer-funded collection of government-union political money gives
union bosses an unfair political advantage. In Pennsylvania, government
unions reported spending nearly $5 million in dues on political activity
and lobbying in 2012, plus more than $2.6 million in campaign
contributions. All of that money was collected using public resources
and sent directly to union bosses.
Nationally, the numbers are even more astounding: Labor unions spent more than $1.6 billion on politics in 2011 and 2012.
While government-union bosses argue their political spending will
“protect the middle class,” the policies they support actually harm
middle-class families, including their own members.
Here in Pennsylvania, union politicking recently blocked pension
reform — resulting in higher taxes and teacher layoffs — and
liquor-store privatization, despite overwhelming public support for the
latter measure, even among union members. Union-funded ad campaigns
against charter schools prevented thousands of children from escaping
violent and failing schools. Government unions lobbied for Obamacare
too, to the detriment of school employees and taxpayers.
Matt Eason, a teacher in the Philadelphia suburbs, opposes his
union’s politics: “It’s going against, not only my beliefs and morals
and values,” he says. “It’s something I don’t want to support, but I
don’t have a choice.”
Because Pennsylvania is a compulsory union state (as opposed to a
right-to-work one), paycheck protection would empower teachers like Matt
to hold his union accountable. Instead of automatically deducting money
from his paycheck, union leaders would have to look Matt in the face
each pay period to explain how the union plans to spend his money, and
ask for his dues.
Paycheck protection doesn’t silence union voices in politics; nor
does it hinder unions’ ability to collectively bargain. It certainly
isn’t right to work. It simply means that government unions will have to
collect their own dues and political money just like every other
private political organization.
Paycheck protection would, however, do one thing that both sides of
the political aisle should agree on: Stop spending taxpayer money on
politics.
Matthew J. Brouillette, a former history
teacher, is the president and CEO of the Commonwealth Foundation,
Pennsylvania’s free-market think tank.
eMarketer.com estimates that most U.S. adults used a digital coupon in 2013 and that number is expected to grow to 55 percent this year.
William Lawrence Sr Omnibit 3-17-14
Asa Booth’s corn fritters go great with a Cryptowit Quote Puzzle from William W. Lawrence Sr.
The full House is considering a bill to protect police dogs, reports State Rep. Jim Cox (R-129)
The Judiciary Committee last week unanimously voted to advance a bill to strengthen felony charges for anyone who deliberately harms or kills a K-9 officer in the line of duty.
House Bill 2026 would charge any individual who willfully or maliciously tortures, mutilates, injures, disables, poisons or kills a K-9 officer with a second-degree felony, punishable by a maximum fine of $25,000 and 10 years in prison. The measure was introduced in response to the fatal stabbing six weeks ago of Pittsburgh K-9 officer Rocco, whose death drew nearly 1,200 people to the funeral, including many police officers and their K-9 partners.
A person who calls to seek medical attention for someone overdosing on drugs could be immune from prosecution under legislation approved by the House Judiciary Committee, reports State Rep Jim Cox (R-129)
Under House Bill 1149, immunity would be offered as long as an individual provided the correct name and location, cooperated with the responders, and remained with the person needing medical attention until the responders arrived.
Currently, a person who contacts law enforcement or emergency personnel by reporting a drug overdose or transporting someone to get help could face prosecution for possession, use or other offenses related to the presence of the controlled substance at the scene. If prosecuted, their emergency telephone call or actions would be admissible against them. The goal of the bill is to reduce drug overdose deaths, which have increased substantially over the last two decades.
The bill is now before the full House.
Saint Patrick was a rich Brit born in 390 and kidnapped at age 16
where he was taken to Ireland to work as a sheep-herding slave.
The message—really an SOS—about public school funding came from rural Tioga County, but it’s one most Pennsylvanians have grown used to hearing.
“We are in a much, much more difficult situation than we were five or six years ago,” a teacher wrote to the Commonwealth Foundation. “We have had to cut staff, programs and even close schools in our district just to stay afloat. We have never been able to offer many extras in our curriculum due to the size of our school and minimal tax base, but now we are down to the bare essentials.”
It’s a story playing out for teachers, parents, and students across the state: slashed staff and scaled back arts and language programs. Why? The popular myth advanced by teachers unions is that Gov. Tom Corbett cut $1 billion from public education funding three years ago.
The truth is far less dramatic—and a lot more sobering.
At the governor’s recent state budget address, the spotlight again swung to education spending. The governor has proposed $10.1 billion for public schools, slightly higher than last year, which was then a record high. So what’s all the fuss about cuts?
School districts are indeed feeling real financial stress, but this stems from a lapse of temporary federal stimulus money—not from a governor’s stinginess.
Initially, the stimulus dollars that came to Pennsylvania went to other types of government spending, like welfare. But the influx in funds allowed then-Governor Ed Rendell to spend more on public education.
However, the stimulus was only a temporary boost. School districts, lawmakers, administrators—everyone in charge knew the money would disappear. But rather than planning for when funding would reset, many school districts added staff and programs they couldn’t sustain.
The victims are now the students and teachers who are wondering what hit them.
While many educators are reeling, it’s important to look at the real status of education funding in Pennsylvania. Adjusted for inflation, average funding per student—made up of local, state, and federal money—has been around $14,000 since 2008.
Of that money, 58 percent goes to instruction, while 12 percent goes to construction and debt, which is one of the fastest-growing spending categories. In fact, between 1995 and 2012, spending on instruction increased 81 percent, while spending on construction and debt ballooned a whopping 171 percent.
At the same time public school officials complained of dwindling resources, they amassed $3.5 billion in reserve funds across the state’s 500 school districts and charter schools—increasing $300 million in the last year alone.
In addition, the disconnect between public school enrollment and staffing has been worsening. Teachers and staff have certainly seen layoffs in the last three years. But since 2000, schools have added 17,000 staff while the number of students actually fell by 60,000.
Over 15 years, administrators and other professional staff grew 40 percent, and support staff 18 percent, while the number of teachers rose only 14 percent.
In short, public school funding been rising—but it hasn’t always been spent in ways that would best benefit our children. And budgets will be squeezed further by the school employee pension system crisis, which holds nearly $33 billion in debt.
To survive, we must spend more effectively. A good start is reforming the broken student funding formula for school districts, which holds funding steady regardless of enrollment changes. As a consequence, districts with growing student populations often receive too little funding.
Another solution is to allow school districts to pre-pay their future pension obligations using their reserve funds. School boards should also be permitted to opt out of prevailing wage mandates, which artificially inflate their construction costs. And schools must be able to keep their best teachers, regardless of age or experience—a commonsense practice currently prevented by state seniority law.
If we’re to help teachers in Tioga and across Pennsylvania, changing we fund public schools—not just —will be critical. If not, teachers, students, and taxpayers will be paying far into the future.
Priya Abraham is a senior policy analyst for the Commonwealth Foundation, Pennsylvania’s free market think tank.
Inky Suffers Alien Abduction? — What we want to know is who took the editorial staff of The Philadelphia Inquirer and what have they done with them.
Today’s edition — and Sunday is the declining daily’s biggest circulation day — featured a double deck extra-large-type, front-page headline declaring how rising uber-lib Democrat star Attorney General Kathleen Kane shut down an corruption investigation started by embattled Republican Gov. Tom Corbett.
Ms. Kane is treated rather harshly in the story, and apparently appropriately so.
Even more amazingly the story contains this paragraph:
Sources with knowledge of the sting said the investigation made financial pitches to both Republicans and Democrats, but only Democrats accepted the payments.
So, has the Inky suffered an alien abduction?
If the Inquirer and their fellows did this kind of work in 2008 and 2012 we might not have had the mind-numbing incompetent we have in the White House.
The peoples of Iran and Syria might free and not living in fear. Venezuelans might have gotten their civil rights back. The Ukraine might not be worrying about an invasion.
And Americans with serious preexisting conditions might not have lost their health care.
William Lawrence Sr Omnibit 3-15-14